2010s
Usually I will have heard about a film before it is released. It’s odd when that doesn’t happen. It’s even odder when the film was originally released almost a year ago and I still haven’t heard about it.
Despite the title being one of the most fascinating I’ve seen in a while, Careful What You Wish For, directed by Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum, is about as painfully average as a neo-noir thriller film can get. You will not be surprised or fascinated at any point in this film, where a younger man takes an older woman (Isabel Lucas) as his lover. Though, said older woman isn’t all that much older than him, sadly showing how limited roles for women are in this industry.
The vast majority of video game films have failed for not respecting their source material, using them only as basic backdrops to put some hackneyed plot in place for a quick cash-grab. Various franchises like Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia have all failed because of this blatant apathy, and because those involved in their making didn’t care about how to integrate the art of making video games with the craft of making films. The less said about the absolute disasters that were the various video game films directed by talentless hack Uwe Boll, the better.
While many recent horror films have been heavily influenced by the works of prominent directors of the 1980s like David Lynch, John Carpenter and David Cronenberg (very good ones like The Guest and It Follows), this one addresses subject matter not even those films were willing to tackle. Richard Powell’s Heir is the next great homage to those great directors, and can proudly be a part of the recent resurgence in thoughtful horror films designed more to represent real world conflicts as opposed to cheap scares. The plot is simple at first:
Whilst people constantly bring up the current increasing slog of superhero films, there’s another string of films that are much worse in their repetitive nature that seemingly seem to go under the radar: the bro/stoner comedy. Seth Rogen could be seen as the unofficial face of the stoner movement, films where a manchild is forced to grow up, usually through the love of a woman, in between bouts of marijuana, pop culture references and hanging out with your “bros”.
Man is an individual only because of his intangible memory; and memory cannot be defined, but it defines mankind. — Ghost in the Shell X-Men: Apocalypse, the capper to the X-Men:
In Matthew Solomon’s Chatter, Agent Martin Takagi (Tohoru Masamune) comes across the intimate video chats of married couple while monitoring Internet traffic for the Department of Homeland Security. The married couple, played by Brady Smith and Sarena Khan, begin to discover that their new home is haunted. In the same vein of horror films such as Paranormal Activity and the more recent Unfriended, the mechanics within this film felt familiar.
Mark of the Witch (also known as Another), written and directed by Jason Bognacki, is described as a horror fantasy film. It tells the story of Jordyn, played by Paulie Rojas, who is confronted with her Aunt Ruth’s (Nancy Wolfe) attempted suicide just minutes after blowing out her birthday candles, and soon discovers a dark secret about herself. Jordyn just wanted to know who she is and where she comes from, which her Aunt Ruth acknowledges is a perfectly normal thing for anyone to wonder about.
Whit Stillman’s adaption of Jane Austen’s relatively unknown novella, Lady Susan, follows the delightfully scandalous exploits of the recently widowed Lady Susan Vernon (Kate Beckinsale). Lady Susan is forced to leave the Manwaring family’s estate in the midst of adulterous allegations, instead taking up residence with her in-laws and their handsome young relative, Reginald DeCourcy (Xavier Samuel), whereby she attempts to marry off her long-suffering daughter and elevate her own social standing in the process. The ensuing events make for one of the most entertaining and joyfully witty Austen adaptations we have yet been treated to on screen.
Within the last couple of years, the Western seems to have made a semi-comeback. Recent notable titles include John Maclean’s directorial debut Slow West, the horror-thriller Bone Tomahawk, and Quentin Tarantino’s claustrophobic and violent The Hateful Eight. And, in just a few months, a remake of The Magnificent Seven will be released, a film adaptation which has attracted the likes of Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Vincent D’Onofrio and more (which is hopefully an indication that it is at least halfway decent).
Shane Black’s The Nice Guys couldn’t come at a better time. Actually, strike that. If it had come out just a few months later after the slog of the summer movie season of blockbuster remakes, sequels, reboots, and rehashes had polluted our minds, then perhaps it would be received all the more with acclaim.
In Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, a treatise about the human condition, he wrote, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” For many people the work they do is pointless, only going far enough to provide limited sustenance while killing the spirit inside which yearns to be free. Naturally, this is nothing new.
It’s very easy for the media to get overexcited about a new Meryl Streep film, and one costarring Hugh Grant and directed by Stephen Frears at that, but this time there’s something different. I think maybe, what with the recent success of The Iron Lady and the confusion over Suffragette (where she was on screen for only a few moments), the media and filmgoers are suffering from a little overindulgence when it comes to one of the world’s greatest actresses. So although Florence Foster Jenkins has been promoted widely, it hasn’t been the film on everyone’s lips.
Every year, we get countless reports that there isn’t enough diversity in Hollywood storytelling. In the past couple of weeks alone, GLAAD’s annual media report has shown that LGBT diversity is only visible in TV, whilst Asian-American actors have begun a protest website called “Starring John Cho”, to highlight the lack of leading roles given to people of their ethnicity. A story that needs to be told There was a line in GLAAD’s celebration of diversity in independent cinema that rung alarmingly true, as they highlighted that diverse audiences shouldn’t have to look to the arthouses for films that relate to them.
On the surface, what the medical industry should be doing is simple: saving and improving lives. All possibilities should be explored and tested, with the breakthroughs made readily available to anyone who needs it.